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4 settings you should change on every new laptop for better performance
Laptop performance out of the box might be enough for most people, but we're not most people. The default laptop settings will get you a solid mix of power and battery efficiency, which is ideal when using the laptop unplugged. But if you want to get the absolute most power out of your laptop, making a few quick tweaks to your system will get you far more performance.
For the sake of not completely tanking your laptop's battery life, I do recommend making these changes only while the laptop is plugged into AC power. While you can still opt for a high-performance laptop setup when on battery power, it will deplete your battery life faster than a more balanced or efficient profile. So do keep that in mind as you make these changes.
Change your power plan
"Best performance" is the way to go
The easiest change you can make is adjusting your laptop's power profile settings. A laptop's power profile is an optimization feature to determine if your hardware should be tuned for better efficiency, performance, or a balance of the two.
On Windows 11, this will be found in the Settings app, under "System" then "Power & battery." Most Windows 11 laptops ship in "Balanced" mode by default. You'll want to swap your laptop to run in "Best performance" mode. You can change your "on power" profile separately from your "on battery" profile, and I do recommend keeping the "on battery" set to either "Balanced" or "Best efficiency."
If you have a high-performance gaming laptop, you may also have additional performance settings in the proprietary app from your laptop's manufacturer. Check your Legion Space, MSI Center, Armoury Crate, Omen Gaming Hub, or Razer Synapse application and make sure your performance profile is set to the highest option.
On macOS, you may have access to a "High Power" mode if your laptop has an M1-M4 Max or an M4 Pro chipset. Other MacBook models only have access to a "Low Power" mode. If you want to ensure your MacBook doesn't enter "Low Power" mode on you, you can find your battery settings under the System Settings app, under "Battery." I tend to set "Low Power" mode to "Never" myself, but setting it to run only on battery is likely the optimal choice.
Optimize your graphics settings
Don't neglect your GPU.
If your laptop features a discrete GPU, you'll also want to make sure you've got those settings optimized for better performance as well. With all new laptops, that means opening the Nvidia App and control panel to make sure your graphics settings are set for optimal performance. You'll also want to make sure you have the correct drivers selected: game or studio.
If you have a gaming laptop, you can either let the app optimize your settings based on your laptop's hardware, or you can adjust things as needed yourself. The Nvidia App does allow you to customize your graphics settings for on AC power and on battery separately. This should get you the strongest graphics performance on all of your games, though you can also make tweaks in the in-game settings as well.
If you have a creator laptop, you'll want to stick to the more general graphics settings in the Nvidia app, though the defaults should get you a solid amount of performance.
Remove startup programs
Get speedier boot times with fewer startup apps
Startup programs won't necessarily impact your laptop's performance in a huge way, but they can. And they will absolutely slow down your boot cycle. Depending on the startup program, you might also get a more responsive machine out of it, but that is not always guaranteed.
On Windows 11, you can adjust your startup programs by going into Task Manager and disabling any unnecessary apps under the "Startup" tab.
On macOS, you can adjust your startup programs by going into System Settings and adjusting your "Login Items" under the General tab. Remove any unnecessary login applications from the list at the top. You can also toggle off any unnecessary background programs as well.
Check for updates
Even new hardware may still have software updates.
You may have just taken your laptop out of the box, but that doesn't mean there are no updates to run. Even brand new hardware can have software and system updates you need to run to get the best performance out of your new machine.
Additionally, software updates that are running in the background can slow your laptop down, giving you less performance than you'd like. The trick to keeping your laptop in top form is keeping your software up to date. Make sure you regularly check your Windows or macOS system updates, drivers, and app updates to keep everything running smoothly.
For older systems
While these four settings tweaks are intended for new hardware, adjusting these settings can also help get more performance out of an older machine. You may also want to consider defragging your hard drive, uninstalling any unneeded programs, and deleting temporary files if your laptop is on the older side.
If you're still struggling with your laptop, there are a few other Windows 11 settings you can change to have a better experience.